My First Two Excursions!

Northern Ireland

For those of you who don't know, which I totally wouldn't have if my comparative politics class didn't spend an entire unit on, Ireland is actually split into two countries.  I'm staying in Dublin, which is in the Republic of Ireland.  Northern Ireland is part of the UK and a separate country.  There is a lot of dispute on whether Northern Ireland should remain a part of the UK or if Ireland should be one united country.  Apparently it's a VERY controversial question to ask people's opinion on.  We obviously didn't know this when we asked everyone we met in the region.  We stopped after someone told us that over 4,000 people have died by asking that very question. Whoops!  It's really cool, though, how amazingly informed everyone is about their history there.  From taxi drivers to bouncers, everyone seems to know what's going on.

The night life was weird and funny.  However most people were old or gay that we encountered.  Both are fine, just not exactly our scene.  We ended up encountering a bachelor party of men who thought we were hilarious (who wouldn't.... am I right?) But they were really funny and actually really, really intelligent.  They knew almost more about American politics than I did, (proud poli sci major right here). I love talking about the US with foreigners.  It's amazing what parts of it they find peculiar that we don't really think twice about.  They also always harp on talking about women's rights and health care here (can I get an amen).  We learned that the word "devastating" can be a good thing.  We learned this the hard way when he said that our American accents were devastating.  When we looked a little embarrassed, he explained that it's a good thing!  "For example," he said, "black hair and blue eyes is a DEVASTATING combo." I then pointed out that he had black hair and blue eyes to which he replied, "like I said, a devastating combo."

We went to a place called the Belfast castle and went for the most amazing hike.  We've been (knock on wood) incredibly lucky when it comes to weather here in Ireland so far.  There are TONS of cold rainy days, but it doesn't seem like any of the days that we try to be outside hiking and seeing the beautiful parts of Ireland fall on those days.  I'm so thankful for this.  Ireland truly is the most beautiful place I've ever been.  I'm not much of a hiker at home, but the amazing landscape of Ireland makes me WANT to get out there and see things.  I love it.


Galway
Galway was by far the greatest place we've been so far.  We had an amazing tour guide who constantly gave us things to do.  We stayed at really cute and fun hostels and it was a great weekend filled with pub crawls, hiking, and lots and lots of cows.




Please take a moment and LISTEN to the song that was the theme of our trip.  It's called Galway girl, and we all learned the words and sang it on the bus ride there (paired with a little fat man scoop karaoke, let's not forget) and at every bar we went to.  It's about a girl from Galway with black hair and blue eyes, (apparently a devastating combo).










The pub crawls were hilarious, fun, and entertaining.  We took shots of "baby Guinness" which luckily taste NOTHING like the real beer, and are actually delicious.  They were cute lil babies and they started off the pub crawl right (see picture on the right).  We then played a bunch of other games like beer pong, boat race (chugging relay race where you turn your cup upside-down on your head when you're done... so you better've drank the whole thing), and the Guinness challenge where you had to try and drink your Guiness to an exact spot in the glass where the beer and foam meet  on the first try. Very cute and fun.  There were also many other fun opportunities on the pub crawl, please refer to the picture on the left of you would like more details.


The next day we went to the Cliffs of Moher which are considered to be one of the 7 natural wonders of the world.  It was one of the most incredible things I've ever seen.  It was breathtakingly beautiful.  There was also no fence on a lot of the ledges so you were just standing on the edge of a huge cliff with nothing to catch you if you slipped.  Pretty exhilarating. There's not much to say about the cliffs apart from how beautiful they were, but I was so happy to have had the opportunity to go there.  I loved every minute of it.

I love Ireland and I'm so thankful to be here,Cheers,Sophie